Edit and Relink Embedded Images in Adobe Illustrator Using Phantasm CS
Phantasm CS Studio and Publisher allow editing of embedded images by opening them directly in Photoshop. You can also relink one or a selection of embedded images using this plugin. Find out more at the jump.
Editing of Embedded Images
Embedded images are raster (or “bitmap”) images placed into the working space of the current document and then embedded into it. They can also be raster effects that you produced in the process of work, such as using the Photoshop Effects .
Phantasm CS Studio and Publisher allows the editing of embedded images, opening them directly in Photoshop, and then updating them in Illustrator. Let’s see how this is done on the example of raster effects.
The original object for editing will be background with a raster texture. I added a new fill of gray color to the rectangle and applied the Note Paper Effect .
A drop shadow will be the second object , I applied to the text.
Select all the created objects, then go to . Now our document contains embedded images. You can verify this by opening the Layers panel or Links panel.
Select the embedded image and go to . The Edit menu contains this and two additional re-link entries if you have the Phantasm CS Studio or Publisher installed.
As a result of this action, the embedded image opens in Photoshop (or your currently set photo editing software set to open .PSD Photoshop files automatically).
Of course, it is more convenient to edit raster images in a photo editor, which is specifically designed for that. After applying a few filters and effects, the texture looks as shown in the following picture…
Save the achieved result in Photoshop , then go back to Adobe Illustrator. Now, without deselecting the image, in order to update the embedded image go to .
Do the same with drop shadows. Open and edit them in Photoshop (.
Save the changes in Photoshop and update drop shadows in Adobe Illustrator .
Relink Embedded Images
With the help of Phantasm CS Studio and Publisher, we can easily convert Embedded images into Linked images. Select all the objects of the current document and go to . Phantasm CS finds all embedded images in the selection and opens a dialog window where we can see the information about the image and its preview.
Here, we can rename the image and change its location.
We are able to switch between embedded images (Next button), to skip the image leaving them embedded (Skip button), or Relink all the embedded images (Link All button).
Either way, the image will be converted to a a linked image and saved in the specified place in the .PSD Photoshop format. This format is used due to it’s technical ability to cater for all image types which may be found embedded in Illustrator – right from simple monochrome to multi-ink with masks.
You can also edit the linked images. To do this, select it and click the Edit Original button in the Links panel, which will open the image in Photoshop. Edit and save changes to Photoshop. When returning to Adobe Illustrator, you will see a warning window prompting us to update the image. Click Yes.
Hopefully, after reading this brief article, you will have discovered a much more convenient and flexible way to work in Illustrator.
About the author
My name is Iaroslav Lazunov, I am a graphic designer from Zhytomyr, Ukraine. I am glad that I finally found the job in my life that I can share my knowledge and experiments with you in my tutorials.
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